Best tube amps: unlock incredible tone with our pick of the greatest tube amps you can buy right now

It is true that amp technology has come a long way, but there’s still something magical about a good old fashioned tube amp. Their primal sound hits on an almost cellular level that nothing else can match.

But what is it exactly about tube amps? First and foremost, it’s the tone. You can bet that the best tube amps will sound sonically complex and organic, regardless of whether you’re looking for raucous overdrive, or chimey cleans. Then there's the feel; instantaneously a symbiotic relationship emerges between player and amplifier, one naturally reacting to the other, as even the smallest change in playing can drastically alter the sound.

You kind of know what you’re getting with a tube amp, and whilst their tones can be intricate, their functionality is often simple – certainly more so than complicated modeling counterparts. If you’re looking for something smooth and authentic, nothing but a genuine tube amp will do.

With so many tube amps on the market, varying wildly in shape, size and power rating, choosing the right one for you can be a daunting task. Worry not, though. With this guide, we're going to let you know what the best tube amps around are across every price point and size.

Simon Fellows

When Simon's childhood classical guitar teacher boasted he 'enjoyed a challenge', the poor man had no idea how much he'd underestimated the scale of the task ahead. Despite Simon's lack of talent, the experience did spark a lifelong passion for music. His classical guitar was discarded for an electric, then a room full of electrics and the rest is history. Simon is now a regular contributor to Guitar World and MusicRadar where he reviews guitar gear and writes buyer's guides like the one you're reading now.

The quick list

Want to cut to the chase and find out exactly which we think are the best tube amps on the market right now? Below, you’ll find a round-up of our top choices. You can jump to a more detailed review of every pick, along with our price comparison tool to help you find the best deals.

Best overall

The best tube amps available today

Below you'll find full and detailed write-ups for each of the best tube amps in our list. We've tested each one extensively, so you can be sure that our recommendations can be trusted.

Mesa amps have a reputation for being complex monsters, and we love them for that. Loads of gain and lots of sliders, switches, knobs – you get the picture.

However, this stunning amp is a complete departure. It's Randall Smith's homage to Leo Fender's amp designs of the 1950s – hence the 'Tweed' moniker. The story goes that when Randall started building Mesa/Boogie amps in the 1960s, he was heavily influenced by Leo's tweed circuits. He loved the organic-sounding voicings, and the way they smoothly transitioned from sparkly clean to distortion and back again, which was partly down to their use of 6V6 tubes. 

The California Tweed 6V6 4:40 is a delightfully simple amp, both to behold and to use. The uncluttered control panel features just seven chicken-head knobs for gain, master, EQ, presence and reverb, plus a Multi-Watt selector, which alters the output from 40 watts down to just two. There's a normal input plus a clean input, which is padded down so that it doesn't drive the preamp as much for maximum headroom.

The Multi-Watt selector is fascinating because it offers much more than just the five power levels marked around the dial: 2W, 10W, 20W, 30W and 40W. For each selection, different circuits and operating classes are brought into play, offering different voicings and providing scope for endless tonal experimentation.

Simplistically, the 2W setting is perfect for high-gain sounds in a home setting, while clicking around to 40W will give you a ton of clean headroom for your effects rig. However, the reality is much more nuanced and interesting than that.

Whatever setting you choose, Randall's California Tweed delivers on its promise of delicious 6V6 smoothness and dynamics. With its warm bottom end, crystal highs and long-tank spring reverb, it'll reward you with some of the best tones you'll ever hear from your guitar.

The California Tweed is also available as a head.

Best value

This amp's a right little devil. Provoke it and it'll spit scalding fire and brimstone, but backing off a touch will reward you with the most gorgeous saturated tones, worthy of boutique amps many times the price.

It's wearing a Fender badge, so you can also expect the kind of clean, sparkly tones that will always be associated with Leo. In fact, this latest iteration, the IV, has been modded to provide more headroom – a quality that was somewhat lacking in previous models. 

The reworked preamp circuit also lends a creamier, more powerful tone across the board. Lows have lost their flabbiness and the highs glister rather than pierce. Stomping on the Fat switch now serves up mids beefier than a thick slice of sirloin. 

The Blues Junior IV's 12" Celestion A-Type speaker, famed for its sparkle at lower volumes and adored for its growl when driven, is an inspired choice. However, if you prefer, you can choose Fender's slightly more expensive Blues Junior Lacquered Tweed version, which is fitted with a more vintage-voiced Jensen speaker.

Awesome tone aside, a big part of the Blues Junior IV's appeal is its manageable size and weight, and affordable price. Few other amps of this size and cost can compete with its lineage, all-tube design and genuine spring reverb. 

Downsides? If you're looking for a home practice amp, then be warned that, despite its small size, the Blues Junior IV is a pretty loud bit of kit – perfect, in fact, miked up for small gigs. Little amps can sound a bit 'boxy', but this feisty Fender is no worse than any of its competitors in that respect. Explore more picks for the best tube amps under $1,000.

Read the full Fender Blues Junior IV review 

Best for volume

Reading through a list of AC30 users is like rattling through a Who's Who of contemporary music – The Beatles, the Stones, The Yardbirds, Rory Gallagher, The Edge, Brian May, Jonny Greenwood, Ed O’Brien, Noel Gallagher, Matt Bellamy, Tom DeLonge… Who hasn't played this thing?

The AC30's got a reputation for two things: unique tone and unparalleled volume. This is the sound that helped power The Shadows in the late '50s, the British Invasion of the mid-'60s, rock throughout the '70s and countless genres since. 

We can thank a bespectacled Hank Marvin for the ear-splitting volumes this amp is capable of. In the late '50s, The Shadows’ Vox AC15s were being drowned out by Cliff Richard’s screaming fans, so Hank asked for something a bit louder. Vox founder Thomas Jennings obliged in the shape of the AC30.

Vox has been through a lot of different owners since then, and there have been countless iterations of the AC30 – some good, some bad. This particular version, with its hand wiring, Alnico speakers, Top Boost circuit and ECC83/EL84 tubes, tips a hat to the legendary early-'60s spec. Without spending an arm and a leg on an original, it's the closest you're currently going to get to the amps produced in the golden years of the AC30's history.

What defines that AC30 sound? Hank Marvin used one for its colorful, chimey-clean sound that's very different in character to a sparkly Fender but just as enchanting. Rory Gallagher and Brian May rated the AC30 for its fat, smooth, progressive overdrive. Everyone, it seems, loves the complex mids and classic crunch tones. 

Vox also sells a hand-wired version with Celestion G12M Greenback speakers for almost half the price, but the Celestion Blues will give you the most authentic tone. The cheaper-still, non-hand-wired 'Custom' versions also include reverb and tremolo, if this is important to you.

Best for retro looks

Back in the '50s and '60s, Supro amps really were rock 'n’ roll royalty, defining the sound of a generation. This little amp channels much of that vintage vibe, both in terms of tone and looks – its quirky appearance is lifted straight from those ’50s gems, such as the Supro Chicago 51.

A quick glance at the specs reveals that the Delta King 12 is clearly a direct rival to the similarly retro-looking Fender Blues Junior IV. Both are small, straightforward 15W all-tube amplifiers with spring reverb and surprisingly affordable price tags. 

Engage the FET-driven boost and this little amp really sings – it's easily loud enough for rowdy pub gigs (there's a line out for larger venues). Call up the Pigtronix FAT gain circuit – Supro and Pigtronix are brand stablemates – to add a knee-deep covering of silky-smooth overdrive. Both features can be kicked in using the optional SF4 footswitch; it's just a shame that Supro didn't see fit to bundle it in for free.

Even without the boost or drive, this little Delta King will break up very pleasingly with enough input from your guitar's volume knob and good playing dynamics. Back off, and the tone cleans up – just the way a good tube amp should.

So, this or the Fender? Well, although the specs are similar, there are some key differences – aesthetics, power amp tubes, speaker, overdrive and so on – so it really comes down to which voicing you prefer and whether you can live with the appearance. Us? We'd be happy with either.

Read the full Supro Delta King 12 review 

Best for blues

Legend has it that when a young Eric Clapton mislaid his Marshall JTM45 in Greece, he asked Jim Marshall to design and build him a new combo amp, similar in size to the Vox AC30, so that he could easily fit it in the trunk of his car. Jim's solution was the open-backed 1962, which Eric used on many of his best-known tracks with John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers – hence the 'Bluesbreaker' suffix.

This particular version is part of Marshall's Vintage Reissues line, for those who “want to recreate nostalgic memories”. Up until recently, there was a considerably more expensive hand-wired version, but that appears to have been discontinued for now.

The sonic beauty of the 1962 lies in the way that it breaks up under power. For a Marshall, it's a relatively clean amp with a crisp high-end response that, even when wound up to 11, won't fully distort into mush. Instead, you're rewarded with beautifully articulate saturation that appears early and progressively. Compression, sustain, warmth and vibrance – what more could you ask for?

Apparently, Eric used his at full chat on the Blues Breakers album, to elicit the feedback he required, but you can still hear his distinct playing cutting through the mix like a hot knife through butter.

True to the original, this is a simple amp with tremolo, a handful of controls and little else in the way of features. Clearly, it's not an exact reproduction of Eric's amp – the hand-wired version was much closer – but it's in the right ballpark. If you're looking for that Beano tone, it's a great place to start – though it would be unfair to pigeon-hole it as a one-trick wonder. The 1962 is a vintage-voiced, well-mannered amp that'll deliver across many genres.

An original will probably set you back five figures or more, making this a bit of a bargain.

Best compact option

Blackstar's HT series of amplifiers took the guitar world by storm on their release, with their low-wattage offerings catching the eyes of guitarists all over the globe. The original HT-1 and HT-1R were both fan favorites, so it's only right that the MKII is killer, too.

 The HT-1R MKII carries over all of the best features of its predecessors. With one watt of all-tube power, it creates an almost unstoppable amount of harmonically rich tonal bliss - something you'd struggle to expect from a single 8" speaker bolted onto a two-tube amp section.

This amp is not only tonally impressive - the features which Blackstar has managed to incorporate into the HT-1R MKII make it a contender for the title of 'ultimate home amp'. Of course, we're talking about the USB emulated output - which turns your HT-1R MKII into an audio interface, capturing and immortalising your all-tube tone. 

Not too bad, eh? Well, for less than $350, it's marvellous. For more budget options take a look at our guide to the best tube amps under $500.

Best for gain

Dave Friedman cut his teeth in 1980s LA, piecing together rigs for California's biggest rock stars and session musicians. That experience, together with an instinctive feel for knowing what working musicians really require from their equipment, led him to modding and developing amps for the likes of Eddie Van Halen, Steve Stevens and Jerry Cantrell. 

It's fair to say that the culmination of all that knowledge is embedded in Friedman's flagship amp, the BE-100 Deluxe; a three channel, 100W all-tube head that's hand-wired in the US.

Like all Friedman amps, the BE-100 Deluxe is inspired by the Marshall sound of the 1960s – more specifically, Dave's favorite amp of that era, the 1968 JMP Plexi. The Friedman blueprint takes that 'British sound' and modernizes it, not just by adding more gain, but by figuring out how it's possible to get those outstanding driven tones at lower volumes.

The BE-100 Deluxe has two overdrive channels, developed, we suspect, for those who drool uncontrollably at the prospect of high-gain crunch. The first channel, the Brown Eye, is moderately driven, while retaining clarity and nuance. The second channel, the wonderfully named Hairy Brown Eye, is properly driven and then some, but also remains beautifully articulate. Each channel has its own gain and master controls, so you can fully explore one without influencing the other, and vice versa.

The third channel, which is heavily influenced by that aforementioned Plexi tone, is borrowed from Friedman's acclaimed Smallbox amp. Lower in gain, it cleans up really well, but delights in flaunting some Plexi-style grit when called upon to do so. All three channels respond superbly to playing dynamics – noodling through the BE-100 Deluxe is a very tactile experience.

It's easy, and rather lazy, to typecast the BE-100 Deluxe as a gain monster. In fact, it's way more versatile and capable than that. From 'Saturation Switch' to 'Thump Knob', this head is littered with useful tone-shaping tools that'll introduce you to a massive gamut of usable sounds. The only obstacle for most of us will be the eye-watering cost. We can all dream…

Best for low volume

While we guitarists love nothing better than sitting at home in front of a cranked amp all day, it's probably safe to assume that family and neighbors rarely share the same level of enthusiasm. In fact, let's be honest, playing a 30W tube amp at volume – clean or driven – becomes pretty tiring for us, too, after a surprisingly short amount of time.

That's where a small, low-wattage tube amp like the Gremlin comes in. Like all Tone King amps, it rocks a goofy retro-futuristic aesthetic, which we really rate. If black is too somber for you, it's also available in Surf Green and a few other colors.

It's a really straightforward little amp based on a very simple premise – what if you could pack a vintage Fender Blackface and a Fender Tweed into the same little box? Plug your guitar into the Rhythm input and you've got Blackface tone at your fingertips, with bell-like highs and increased headroom. Plug into the Lead input to discover more distorted tones reminiscent of a driven Tweed amp. It's even possible to jump between them or blend the two channels with an optional A/B/Y switch.

Recognizing that even five watts can generate a significant amount of volume, Tone King has equipped the Gremlin with its Ironman II attenuator, which reduces volume even when the power amp is being fully driven. This preserves tone to an extent, despite the fact that the speaker won't be breaking up or compressing.

Controls are scant; there's just a rotary volume knob and a single tone knob. Nevertheless, it's easy to achieve a myriad of tones with the Gremlin's two channels, and rather refreshing not to get bogged down in endless EQ options.

Although the Gremlin is a natural for home or studio use, the line out means it's quite possible to gig with it.

Best for versatility

Victory is a brand that has taken the world by storm. Helmed by Martin Kidd – ex-chief engineer at Cornford – their whole range of all-tube amps is worthy of huge praise, but our pick of the bunch is ‘The Jack’ V30 head – previously known as The Countess – designed in collaboration with Guthrie Govan.

As the name might suggest, the V30 is a ‘jack of all trades’, and with 42W of power packed into a miniscule package, this amp punches far beyond its size. The clean channel has ample headroom, to give you glassy clean tones, whilst the overdrive channel produces more gain than you’ll ever need. The addition of the footswitchable ‘Nomod’ switch on the MKII changes the character of the bottom end, giving you a tighter tone that is much better suited to higher gain.

There isn’t much more you would want in an amp of this size, though the lack of reverb is a bit of a shame. Whilst other brands pioneered the lunch box head, Victory has perfected the recipe.

Best for metal

The original Orange tone, from the late '60s and early '70s, was associated with the sonic plat du jour – blues-tinged rock. Sadly, the brand fell into the doldrums in the ’80s, faring rather better with the '90s Britpop scene. But by the early 2000s, modern high-gain metal was inspiring the amp-buying public, forcing Orange to play catch-up. 

The result was the Orange Rockerverb, a no-holds-barred metal amp that quickly became a favorite of Slipknot's Jim Root. Perfect for the genre, it took no prisoners! 

The Rockerverb 50 MKIII is still a metal powerhouse, but over the years it's matured into a more rounded, multi-talented product. Most noticeably, there's much more headroom and the clean channel has been revoiced for a crisper response that's still warm but never murky. 

The gain channel can still dish the dirt with the best of them, but even that cleans up rather nicely when you want it to.

Using the switchable power output is another way to shape your tone. At the full 50W, there's acres and acres of headroom to play with. However, engage half-power mode and the power amp starts clipping more readily, yielding more accessible, smooth-saturated tones. It's hardly an exclusive or ground-breaking feature, but it's welcome nonetheless.

There's a foot-switchable attenuator onboard, too, meaning you can crank away to your heart’s content, while keeping the volume at reasonable levels. 

The Orange Rockerverb 50 MKIII is a modern classic that hasn't lost muscle tone or gained flab as it’s matured. Instead, it's broadened its skillset.

Best tube amps: Buying advice

How to choose the best tube amp for you

Choosing a tube amp can be a lot more straightforward than picking out a modern modeling amp, because purity and simplicity tend to be the focus, rather than which is the most complex or has the most outlandish features. As players of fine tube amps, we're so heavily into authentic tone that just the flick of a standby switch can send a tingle down our spine. Heaven is the warm glow of an EL84; the distinctive, faint hum of a tube-driven power section.

Of course, it would be ridiculous to suggest that tone isn't important when choosing a modeling amp too. Brands such as Kemper, HeadRush, Line 6, Boss and Fractal have taken modeling into a new stratosphere in recent decades, meaning that their impressive boxes, laden with DSP firepower, are a force to be reckoned with. They sound incredible, offer a dizzying array of emulations and effects, and are far more convenient (and reliable) to use than tube amps in many circumstances.

For some of us, though, they are overcomplicated and can induce option paralysis. The bewildering number of available amp models, effects, routings and settings hampers our creativity rather than feeding it. If sculpting our tone involves scrolling through multiple mile-long menus, aren't we in danger of losing sight of what we're trying to achieve in the first place? Namely, making music?

Brian Eno once maintained that endless possibilities stifle creativity. His solution was to “confine people to a small area of maneuver”. As it happens, tube amps provide enough scope for maneuver, but as creative tools they're very manageable. And for the purists among us, they have that tangible ‘realness’ that modelers can’t provide.

Choosing the right one for you still requires a little knowledge, so here's our guide to what to look out for.

The first thing most guitarists consider when starting on their amp-buying journey is how loud they want their guitar playing to be. Then they'll start looking at wattage figures because, well, that's how the industry groups its products.

The problem is that the wattage won't accurately tell you how loud an amp is – particularly a tube amp – or what sort of volumes it can attain. That's partly because ‘loudness’ is an imprecise, subjective term – if you think about it, we all perceive it differently.

Whilst metrics like sound-pressure levels and decibels (dB) can be a genuinely useful barometer of loudness, being presented with an amp’s Wattage feels more arbitrary.

Our brains do perceive tube amps to be louder than solid-state amps, due to the way they break up and compress differently. Similarly, we also perceive distorted sounds to be louder than clean sounds. Our ears are also much less sensitive to low and high frequencies, which is why bass amps tend to require much more power than guitar amps.

In fact, this phenomenon becomes even more marked at low volumes, which is relevant, because if you turn down a guitar amp that's not been voiced for those lower volume levels, you may find that most of your tone disappears – something high-power tube amps can be guilty of.

To complicate matters even further, speaker size, number, impedance and efficiency have a huge part to play in how loud an amp sounds. As does room size, because a large amp in a small bedroom will always sound louder than it does on a big stage.

We wish there was a more precise way to predict the volume of your new tube amp but, for the reasons explained above, the vague notion of volume as a product of wattage is usually all we have. So, here's a rough guide to what's watt. Just take our recommendations with a pinch of salt – for example, the Vox AC30 is famously loud for a 30W amp.

1 – 3 watts

This is bedroom-volume territory. A 1W tube amp will still be surprisingly loud but will break up quite quickly. So, if you're looking for clean tones, you may be better off with a more powerful amp with more headroom.

5 – 15 watts

These are amps that'll keep up with a well-mannered drummer in a modest-sized room. They can be mic'd up for louder bandmates in larger venues, and they’re also perfect for providing plenty of clean headroom at bedroom-level volumes, but will likely break up if used on stage.

20 – 40 watts

A real sweet spot for gigging in pubs and clubs. There's usually more than enough clean headroom, plus the facility to produce power-amp distortion at higher volumes. Many amps this size also have attenuators that'll reduce their volume by half, putting saturated tones within easier reach.

50 – 90 watts

Plenty of clean headroom for jazz, as well as genres where the signature sound relies on preamp distortion.

100 watts and above

In recent years, these giant stacks of power have been replaced by smaller amps miked up and played through ever more sophisticated PAs. But some bands rely on the unique sound of a driven stack – there's nothing quite like it.

Other uses for tubes 

Tubes are also used in rectifiers and reverb tanks. Rectifiers most commonly use the GZ34 tube, while reverb units will use a 12AX7 or a 12AT7.

Tubes used to be found in many kinds of electronic appliances, but in most products they were made obsolete by solid-state alternatives decades ago. This has reduced the demand for tubes dramatically, and they're now only made in certain parts of the world, such as China, Russia and Slovakia. Quality can vary from very good to rather poor, so buy carefully.

Can you swap one kind of tube for another to get a different sound? Some amp brands actively encourage experimentation; others are adamant that you shouldn't do it. Refer to your amp's manual or seek advice from your local amp dealer, as you will likely need to get your amp re-biased if you change your tubes.

Will you be using your amp home or away? 

If you're a gigging musician, don't underestimate how bulky or heavy some of the more powerful amps are. One reason that modeling boxes and floor units have proved so popular is that their compact size and low weight make them easier to live with.

On a similar note, if you're a bedroom player (nothing wrong with that), think carefully before investing in a big, powerful amp on the basis that it’s the one your favorite guitar hero used or uses. It's true that some can be attenuated, but most likely you'll just end up with an amp that's bound to upset the neighbors.

A great compromise is to get a much smaller amp (the attenuated Tone King Gremlin, for example) that has a line out. You can then play at home to your heart's content but also hook it up to the house PA when gigging. No more back pain loading it into the van, either.

Hand wiring vs PCB 

Way back when, all amps were hand-wired, and popular lore has it that they all sounded fabulous. Then printed circuit boards came along and now everything sounds dire. Only kidding!

Most of us have a romantic view of the benefits of hand-wired amps. After all, Pete, Jimi, Mick, Jeff, Jimmy and Eric would all have played hand-wired amps exclusively back then. 

Hand-wiring also lends that boutique, artisanal vibe that makes us feel far more comfortable when handing over a large wedge of cash – we feel a bit short-changed when retro reissues sport PCBs. Point-to-point wiring also looks more beautiful than a soulless circuit board. 

Does hand-wiring sound better? The jury's out on that one, because both methods of construction can sound superb.

Is it more reliable? If you're on a world tour, frequently bouncing an amp around in the hold of a long-haul aircraft, then PCBs are probably the way to go. Tube amps aren’t known for their ability to travel at the best of times, let alone when their interiors have been delicately fused together by hand.

Will hand-wired amps last longer? It's hoped that new legislation will force brands to stock spares for at least 10 years, so your PCB amp should be around in the medium term at least. However, hand-wired amps should be here for as long as somebody keeps selling soldering irons.

It's not unusual for brands to take a hybrid approach, hand-wiring some critical parts but using circuit boards for the rest.

What do these bits do? 

When looking for an amp, you may come across terminology that's readily banded about but rarely explained. Don't worry, we've got your back.

Rectifier: A rectifier converts AC voltage into the high DC voltage that your amplifier's valves need in order to operate. In vintage amps these were valve-driven, but most modern amps now use solid-state rectifiers because they are more reliable and more efficient. 

However, purists maintain that valve rectifiers help amplifiers to sound more compressed, loose and organic.

Multiple rectifiers – dual, triple and so on – are used to increase wattage/power. They sound cooler in marketing materials, too.

Bias: In a nutshell, going through the process of biasing your amp will enable the power amp tubes to run optimally. You'll hear better tone and benefit from longer tube life. Depending on the amp, biasing may be recommended every time you change the tubes or only if you decide to fit ones with a different specification. 

A quick word of warning: the process can be dangerous if you don't know what you're doing, so it may be best left to your friendly guitar technician.

Plexi: Don't worry, plexi isn't a technical term at all. It originates from the series of amps that Marshall built in the '60s that featured Plexiglas panels – most notably the 1959 Super Lead. Since then, it's been used to describe said amps – or, more generically, the characteristic Marshall sound from that period. 

It's a class thing 

Amp manufacturers will often proudly publish amplifier ‘class’ designations in their marketing specs, so it's useful to have some insight into what they mean. We've simplified the explanations somewhat for brevity!

You'd think that Class A amplifiers would be the best of the best, wouldn't you? In fact, in Class A amps, the power valves are working all the time, which makes the amp very inefficient and less able to produce power. That said, they’re favored for their sensitivity to touch and playing dynamics.

In Class B amps, the valves get to have a rest for half the time. The upshot of this is that they're much more efficient and can produce more power. However, the unusual way in which Class B delivers power and distortion isn't well suited to guitar amplifiers, so you won't ever see them. 

Class AB amplifiers are a mix of the two technologies, blending some of the dynamic playing characteristics of Class A with the power of Class B. Class AB amps are said to be punchier with firmer lows.

Which is better? Despite what many people believe, these class ratings are not indicative of quality. They're just technical terms to describe how a power section works, that's all.

One thing we can be sure of is that all tube amps are in a class of their own.

How we test tube amps

When it comes to testing, there are a few things we like to do to put an amplifier through its paces. That said, we must first mention that as guitar amps come in various shapes and sizes, how we test them can differ, depending on the amplifier's intended use. For example, volume and projection are massive considerations when it comes to amps designed to be played on stage or in a rehearsal room, but not so much for home use practice amps. 

What shouldn't change between home and live amps is the build quality, and that's the first thing we look for. For us, all amps should be well made and sturdy, regardless of their application. In our opinion, guitar amps should feel robust and able to withstand anything you throw at them, and the controls should be smooth, with just the right amount of resistance. 

To test the amps out tonally, we'll start where most guitarists start, everything straight up the middle. This usually allows us to hear the amp at its most sonically honest. We'll then dive in and start shaping the sound to how we like it, paying careful attention to the sweep of the EQ controls in particular. We'll also be sure to test the amp at both ends of the gain spectrum, from as much saturation as we can get to as clean as possible. 

If an amp has any other features, such as effects or attenuators, we'll be sure to go through them as well, making sure we've tested every last extra onboard. 

Read more about our rating system, how we choose the gear we feature, and exactly how we test each product.  

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